saved a cardiac arrest

[Parmaboy]

I had my first true save the other day. I have had full arrests where we have gotten pulses back, but they never walked out of the hospital. The other day was different. It was probably due to luck, and short down time more than anything, but its still pretty cool.
Call came in as 70 year old person SOB. once onscene family is screaming from upstairs "they're not breahting" We grab all our equipment, and find the FD applying AED. Pt has agonal respirations. AED advises no shock advised. CFD starts ventilating pt with BMV/o2. Hooked up our Lifepak and saw what was probably a 3rd degree Heart block, but no pulse. The rhythm was very difficult to determine, I asked about 5 other paramedics and got different opinions. The point was though that she went into PEA. Long story short, the ventilations alone brought pt back. A few minutes after ventilating pt was awake, CA+Ox4, stating she was fine and wanted to sit up. pt acted like nothing big ever happened. One cause of PEA is hypoxia, so it doesnt suprise me that it heleped, but it was still amazing to see such quick turnaround with nothing but better Oxygenation.

[DepChief]

Excellent!!! I wish there were more outcomes such as yours!! Good job to everyone involved.

[gruntmedik]

I have seen that little green bottle left on the truck more often than not. I'll never understand why.

Good job.:thumbsup:

[RyanNREMTP]

Do you remember what the rate was during PEA?

Good save. I haven't had one walk out of the hospital yet, that I know of.

[buzz12]

Is that not the greatest feeling. This is why we do it. I just had a save sunday.

[Parmaboy]

I am going to work on scanning in a copy of the 3 lead before and after. keep you eyes peeled for it. I still am not confident of what the rhythm was, besides FUBAR.

[chrisemt]

Dude, don't worry about what the rhythm on the monitor was or wasn't. If you hade a rhtyhm with no pulse, it's PEA plain and simple start ACLS. If 5 other medics wrestled with what the rhythm was, I'm a little scared man. Maybe it was 3rd Deg HB but with a weak enough pulse that nobody could feel it or maybe it was the hypoxia. The brain gets pissed when it doens't have o2 or glucose.

Either way, it sounds like you did a good job and the pt walked out of the hosp. Makes all the shoe runs and street jobs worth it.

-Chris